Telecom News by Muntazir Abbas

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Muntazir Abbas is a senior journalist with a decade-long experience covering ICT-telecom sector, and is based out of New Delhi. Joined ET in September 2013, he helped the group to sucessfully launch ETTelecom on October 30, 2013. Muntazir previously worked with the CyberMedia News and UTV New Media.

The spat between the two escalated after a PIL filed by a noted lawyer Prashant Bhushan on behalf of an NGO in the Supreme Court, and a subsequent letter from a lawmaker Ninong Ering, alleging the technology used by public-sector telco was outdated and procured at a high cost.

Established in June this year, the new entrant is aiming to grow at a rate of 300% annually from 2019. The platform, available in as many as 14 local languages such as Hindi, Telgu and Tamil, has 25 million active monthly users.

Aruna Sundararajan Thursday said that the target of $100 billion investment by 2022 as envisaged in the recently-released national policy may turn out to be lesser than the average telecom spend worldwide.

Manoj Sinha Wednesday said that the GSAT-11 satellite launch would help in providing high-speed data connectivity in country’s North Eastern states and hilly regions, and would give a boost to the ambitious BharatNet initiative.

The Centre has appointed Anshu Prakash, a 1986 batch AGMUT (Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Mizoram, Union Territories) officer, presently working as a chief secretary of Delhi, as an additional secretary, following the vacancy caused by Sivasailam's movement.

The UK-based Vodafone group's executive Friday said that taxation and levies were high in India, and the country's telecom industry was going through an enormous financial stress that requires regulatory intervention.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) pulled up Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea for warning subscribers of certain plans that their SIM cards would be deactivated if they do not recharge their pre-paid accounts though these subscribers had the minimum required balance.